


A Second Chance

by thegraytigress



Series: Letting Go [3]
Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Drama, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-07
Updated: 2015-03-07
Packaged: 2018-03-16 19:28:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3500165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegraytigress/pseuds/thegraytigress
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She knows she'll go dancing tonight in her dreams, that she will dance with him for many, many years to come, but she'll live again, love again. She's ready. Filler for "Valediction".</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Second Chance

**Author's Note:**

> **DISCLAIMER:** _Captain America: The First Avenger_ is the property of Walt Disney Studios, Paramount Studios, and Marvel Studios. _Marvel's Agent Carter_ is the property of ABC Studios, Walt Disney Studios, and Marvel Studios. This work was created purely for enjoyment. No money was made, and no infringement was intended.
> 
>  **RATING:** T (adult themes)
> 
>  **AUTHOR'S NOTE:** This is the last of the three ficlets I've written for _Agent Carter_ , the other two being "Not Often" and "Used". Steve/Peggy, of course.

A second chance.

In the end, she supposes that was all she wanted.

A second chance to protect him.  A second chance to keep him safe.

The sun’s setting, spreading glittering gold and pearl upon the East River.  It’s a pretty show, this peaceful summer evening, and the city is quiet.  Protected.  It’s a good feeling, knowing everything she’s done and sacrificed has led to this.  The others, Thompson especially, don’t seem to realize that’s a reward in and of itself.  Until now, maybe she hasn’t, either.  For so long, for the year since she lost Steve and dragged herself immediately back into the world without even much time to grieve, recognition was what she wanted.  Recognition from the army.  From SSR.  From her peers and friends that she’s far more than a pretty face capable of answering phones, fetching lunch, and organizing files.  Recognition that she’s good at her job, a good soldier and a better spy, with a sharp wit and an agile mind and power enough to carry her through anything.  Recognition that she’s more than simply Captain America’s old flame.

The same recognition that Steve always gave her.

And she _is_ more than his old flame.  They all know it now.  But she’s that as well.  Not just Captain America’s old flame, though.  _Steve Rogers’ girl._

For months they’ve dismissed her, a woman in a man’s world, and it hurt.  It was demeaning and condescending and depressing.  It piled on top of her grief, of having her world stolen out from under her by the war and Steve’s death.  Finally they know exactly what she can do.  That’s vindication, if nothing else.  If no one beyond SSR realizes that she was the one who figured out how to stop Leviathan, who spotted the villains through the complex plot, who helped Howard clear his name while saving millions from poisoning from the Midnight Oil, it’s enough that her peers know.  It seems no one else will, if Thompson has his way with that senator and the press flooding SSR.  Honestly, she believes the exposure and credibility will be good for the organization, and in a fitting way, that honors Dooley and what he helped to build.  She can’t begrudge that.  Nor does she think she can begrudge Thompson for wanting the credit.  Or Sousa for wanting to defend her and make things right.  That reminds her so much of Steve, the way Daniel tried to protect her interests when the senator and Thompson brushed her aside and brazenly correct that injustice.  However, that’s something she’ll think of another day.  Tonight she’s meeting an old friend.  Tonight she’s letting him go.  Tomorrow she’s moving on.

Things fill her head as she stands there, looking out over the river.  Her mind drifts, lazily and lethargically visiting moments from the past weeks.  Losing Colleen.  Finding Angie.  Forming such a bond with Jarvis.  Seeing the Howling Commandos again, those gruff and uncouth warriors stirring in her such familiar, comfortable memories.  There was frustration and grief, betrayal and bitterness, and so much danger, but in so many more ways there was _newness_.  New bonds.  New hopes.  It was fun, she realizes, in a way nothing has been since losing Steve.  It was thrilling and vibrant and fulfilling and _satisfying_ , this adventure on which she explicably found herself.  Colorful and empowering, exciting and demanding, _life_ in a way she has so sorely missed.  She feels at peace, too, staring out over the calm waves of the river, the massive, open span of the Brooklyn Bridge holding her in its airy embrace.  She knows who she is again.  _Steve Rogers’ girl._   Who she’ll always be.  _Captain America’s old flame._ Who she wants to be.  _Agent Carter._

She wonders how she could have let herself forget that, that the world doesn’t define her.  It never defined Steve.  And he had such faith in her.  He loved how indomitable she was.  A force with which the world needed to reckon.  How could she have forgotten that?  What he taught her about herself.  About integrity and bravery.  _“You start running, they’ll never let you stop.  You stand up.  Push back.  You can’t say no forever.”_   He always had stood back up, without a doubt or a moment of hesitation.  He got to his feet, fought on, led by example, shone as a symbol.  But to her, he was so much more.  More than anyone saw or knew.  She’s been clinging to that, coveting it, hiding it from the world and trying so desperately to breathe life into it.  She simply can’t.  Not anymore.  So she’s thinking of it all, perhaps not for the last time, but this time she will let it go.  His smile.  The way his eyes glazed with brilliant thought leaning over a map.  The way he fought out front, protecting his men, leading the charge.  The way he gave to everyone, gave to her.  _“One day, when all of this is over, you can be proud of the fact that they’ll see the truth that you’re the one carrying all of us.  And you always have been.”_   How could he have known?  She smiles faintly, feels her eyes burn.  Even now, he’s telling her what she needs to hear.  His faith.  His heart.  Stronger than his shield, than his body, than his mind.  How could she have forgotten?

She remembers now.  With those words, there are others. _“I knew how much Steve meant to you because I know how much he means to me.”_   She knows now that those were more than simply Howard’s lies, spoken in an attempt to placate her.  And there are others words.  Words imploring Howard to come to reason, to see past the illusion in his head.  That was the moment above all others when she realized Stark was truly a good man.  When he flew a mission in his mind to find Captain America in the artic, against all odds and for _her_.  For himself, as well, and for everyone.  But for her.  Desperate to reclaim the one good thing he built that had been lost, the one gift he gave the world that was so prematurely and cruelly torn away from them when they needed it most.  The irony occurs to her now (and not entirely pleasantly) that yet again she was on the other side of radio talking to man about whom she deeply cared as he flew a plane into disaster.  Pleading for him to stop.  Praying that he would.  She’s strong enough to understand that Steve needed to do what he did to save the world.  And she’s strong enough to accept that both she and Howard needed to let that go in order to save it again.

_“I gotta put her in the water.”_

_“I’m bringing Cap back, Peg.”_

_“Peggy, this is my choice.”_

_“He was the one thing I’ve done that brought good into this world.”_

_“Steve is gone.  We have to move on.  All of us.”_

_“I can fix this!”_

_“I know you loved him.  I loved him, too.  But this won’t bring him back.”_

_“I’m gonna need a rain check on that dance!”_

_“As impossible as that may sound, we have to let him go.”_

_“Peg, he was good before I got a hold of him…”_

_“Don’t you dare be late.”_

_“I’ll bring him home.”_

Her eyes burn hotter, but she banishes these thoughts.  It’s not what she wants right now.  She’s here to follow her own advice.  She’s here to move forward, not dwell on the past any longer.  She’s going to take the good memories, the reminders of who Steve was, the good man, the love he inspired in everyone, the love she had for him, and leave behind the guilt and the grief and the longing.  Surrender who she was to embrace what she’s going to become, just as she knows he would want her to do.  That’s why she’s here.  That’s why she needs to do this.  There’s a new life ahead of her, a friend in Angie, an ally in Jarvis, someone who believes in her in Howard… _hope_.  And as much as she hates to think it, Steve has been holding her back.  _Not Steve._   What she could have had had things been different.

Things will never be different.  _He’s gone.  He’s not coming back.  I can’t bring him back._

_I have to let him go._

She sighs softly, letting the tears go freely for once.  Often over the last year she has tried so vehemently to hold them back, to swallow down the pain like a bitter knot in her throat.  She feels it coming now, swelling inside her, and this time she doesn’t hide from it.  She isn’t ashamed of it, of cracking and crumbling and letting herself feel.  Much to her surprise, it’s not this onslaught she feared it would be.  For so long she’s been terrified of being overwhelmed, that if she truly stops to come to terms with what she’s lost, it would consume her.  Stolen moments in the SSR archive.  Indulgences in dreams.  Wayward thoughts.  When it finally comes, now, it’s not a tidal wave of grief pounding against her heart.  It’s quiet, soft, and unassuming.  Sweet and tender.  It’s like he was.  _Loving._

She reaches into her coat pocket, her fingers slipping over the smooth, cold glass of the vial.  She stands still for a moment, gathering herself, breathing the fresh air and feeling her heart beat in her chest.  She hears the rumble of the city, distant, a hum of life and purpose.  Brooklyn.  His home.  There was no better place to do this, nowhere more appropriate than here.  Than where he was born, where he lived.  Humble beginnings.  So much a part of who he was.  It was only fitting to return him to it.  She pulls the vial free of her coat and lifts it reverently into the sunset.  She stares at it, the deep ruby red of his blood, the last of his blood, the last bit of him in this world.  No one can be trusted with this.  Howard is a good man, but he’s not capable of making a sacrifice like this.  Neither is anyone else at SSR, nor anyone in any position of power.  There’s a reason why Steve was chosen for Project: Rebirth, a very good reason.  He understood the worth of power, and that understanding was tempered with compassion.  With responsibility.  With valor and integrity.

And she understands him.  That’s why she must be the one, just as Jarvis said.  _“I am quite certain there is only one person in the world who knows what to do with this.”_

She knows.  _Steve’s legacy._   She wanted to protect it, and she still does.  She wanted to keep him safe, and she still does.  A second chance to honor him, to do what’s right.  A final opportunity to say goodbye.  She pulls the top off the vial carefully, her hands shaking ever so slightly as she raises it above the river.  She cries, of course, the saltiness of tears touching her lips as they track down her cheeks.  And she hesitates, of course, but only for a moment.  Above everything else, Steve taught her to be strong.

So she pours, and the blood runs down into the water.  This is where she lets him go.  She can’t see it fall much beyond the first few feet, the red droplets disappearing into ripples of gray and blue far below.  She finds it within herself to speak.  He deserves it, and so does she.  Her voice is a touch rough, a tad tremulous, but she is steady and sure.  “Goodbye, my darling.”

She doesn’t see the last drops of him disappear.  She doesn’t feel the vial slip from her fingers, tumbling through the air to hit the river soundlessly and vanish beneath the glassy surface.  All she knows is her hands are back in pockets, empty, and she’s alone.

She draws a deep breath.  Another.  And another. 

_Steve’s gone.  I let him go._

This was her last chance to keep him safe.  She knows she has.  She’s kept him safe.  And she knows this is what he would have wanted for her.  _Freedom_.

She stands there for quite some time, the distant sound of music playing in her mind.  The slow swish of cymbals.  Gentle horns.  Someone singing.  She’s there, at the Stork Club, at eight o’clock on the dot.  He’s waiting.  She’s wearing her red dress, lips crimson and hair lush and pinned away from her face to curl upon the nape of her neck.  He’s wearing his service uniform, dapper, handsome, blond bangs brushed away from his brow, blue eyes alive with awe and joy.  His arms are strong around her, confident, and he’s laughing even as he stumbles a bit and nearly steps on her foot.  He smiles that smile he only ever had for her.  He tells her he loves her.  She knows he does.  And they dance.  Forever.

She breathes again.  Sees again.  Feels again.  And she walks away from the railing of the bridge, sniffling once as the tears cool and dry on her cheeks in the evening breeze.  Then she lifts her head high and lets herself be proud.  She’s heading back toward Manhattan.  Her shoes thud against the street in time with her peaceful heart.  Her steps are certain.  Her mind is clear.  She knows she’ll go dancing tonight in her dreams, that she will dance with him for many, many years to come, but tomorrow she’ll be ready to work, to enjoy the friendships she made and the relationships she has forged.  She’ll live again, love again.  She’s ready.

 _“Go on, Peg,”_ he says in her thoughts.  He’s still smiling.  _“It’s alright.”_

She goes on.

**THE END**


End file.
